The Edge

The Edge is a two-day showcase with sponsored sessions designed to help developers build better apps faster, improve user acquisition strategies by maximizing discoverability, track progress with in-depth analytics, and ultimately make more money through new monetization methods.

Who are you? These days you are your phone number. A person’s phone number is now the critical identity tool for both mobile and web applications. Join TeleSign Co-Founder Darren Berkovitz as he discusses the security and user experience implications of different identity tools, and why companies are using mobile phones to establish Mobile Identity.

Speaker:
Darren Berkovitz, Co-Founder and Vice President, TeleSign

1:05 PM

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1:35 PM

How Operators and Device Makers Will Avoid Extinction Through Apps edge

In 2015, only one company made 92% of smartphone profits. Hundreds of hardware companies and operators not named “Apple” are struggling with razor-thin margins, and limited opportunities to differentiate themselves. With HTC trading below cash, LG making 1.2 cents in profit per phone sold, and Samsung seeing its seventh straight decline year over year in quarterly profit, Jim Geison will explore what tactics and solutions the mobile ecosystem will need to survive beyond 2020.

It’s always a challenge for companies to build global presence. Kingsoft Office EVP and President of Americas will present how Kingsoft Office Software builds brand awareness, partnership and distribution channels globally reaching out to 500 million subscribers for its award winning WPS office suite. He will even tell you how to do so with less then $500K. WPS recently won Google Play Editors’ Choice and was named Top 10 best Apps by USA Today.

At present, only 26% of programmers in the U.S. are women, and just 1 in 14 tech employees in Silicon Valley is black or Latino. The research definitively proves the value of a diverse workforce, and yet tech companies continue to struggle to move the needle on diversity. Many companies who want to do the right thing and leverage the business benefits of diversity unwittingly employ strategies for recruiting that fail to generate interest from women and minority candidates. A pervasive preoccupation with the “STEM pipeline” can also sidetrack companies from achieving increased diversity in the business and creative areas where there’s no shortage of diverse talent. In this presentation, Gina Helfrich, co-founder of recruitHER, will share the research that explains why diversity recruiting and retention can be so difficult. She will also discuss best practices for creating a workplace and a brand identity that attracts and keeps diverse talent, and how recruitHER is helping tech companies make tangible progress on their diversity goals.

A unicorn is a startup company valued at $1 billion or more. There are some well-known unicorns: Uber, AirBnB, DropBox, Pinterest, Snapchat, Palantirs… As job seekers, how we can catch the next one? Tom is lucky to work for 3 super unicorns in his career: Google, Tencent and Tesla. He would like to share 10 tips on how to identify an unicorn company.

Speaker:
Tom Zhang, Sr. Recruiter, Tesla Motors

3:25 PM

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3:55 PM

Why the Future of Location Data is Too Important to Trust it to a Single Company edge

MAPS.ME founder Yury Melnichek believes the future of location information is too important to leave in the hands of corporations like Google and Apple. After 3 years at Google Maps, Yury left to found MAPS.ME, which today boasts more than 25 million installs. Built on top of OpenStreetMap, MAPS.ME dreams of a world where the mysteries of Earth’s geography are opportunities for deeper connection between people, and where every individual can contribute to greater global awareness. In late 2014 MAPS.ME was acquired by European Internet giant Mail.ru Group, and has subsequently tripled its user base. Come to Yury’s talk to be the first to learn about an exciting and groundbreaking announcement, revealed exclusively on the GMIC stage.

Moderator:
Kym McNicholas, Host, CBS Tech2

Speaker:
Yury Melnichek, Founder of MAPS.ME, Head of Maps Business Unit, Mail.ru Group

According to a Newzoo study, revenue generated from mobile games is forecasted to be $44 billion by 2018. So how does an app developer get started in this rapidly-growing market? During this session, learn from AppLift and clients as they discuss their early experiences working together and the important lessons they have learned along the way.

Facing highly fragmented audience communities (mobile app, website, numerous social media channels and the booming connected objects….), how do you discover and engage smartly the right audience? In a screen-centric analytics world, what if we rather move forward to a content centric measurement to boost the engagement?Let’s dig in more audience-centric (behaviors) understanding, thanks to smart data. Explore a new generation of indicators, KPI deciphering usages and content values to drive more efficiently marketing strategies.

Cyanogen is evolving the Android platform and creating a more level playing field for app developers and the mobile ecosystem. As the 3rd leading mobile operating system, Cyanogen is driving innovation in mobile computing, empowering consumers, and enabling new kinds of interaction models and experiences across core apps and services. Learn what the future of Android will look like in 2016 and beyond.

How Augmented and Virtual Reality could hit $150 billion by 2020 app, edge

Digi-Capital forecasts that AR/VR could hit $150 billion revenue by 2020. Global AR/VR expert Tim Merel will explain the business and technology drivers, and how the technology will be used. Samsung’s VP of Strategy and Creative Content, Matt Apfel, will show how great content will help to drive the market, including a demonstration of Samsung Milk VR, the 360-degree, immersive video service exclusive to Samsung Gear VR.

We often compare different software stacks, but have you considered ditching the stack all together for your next app? Join Jenny Tong, a developer advocate at Google, for some fun demos of serverless apps and snippets of code. You’ll get a glimpse into how productive you can be when you don’t worry about server code.

Learn what a mobile deep link is and what makes Branch deep links unique. Gain insights and metrics around signups, retention and click to install conversions rates from our partners. Learn how Hotel Tonight, Yummly, Forever 21 and more use deep links to turn their apps into Mobile Growth Engines.

Speaker:
William Lindemann, Director of Growth, Branch Metrics

1:30 PM

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2:15 PM

There’s Gold in Those Streets: A Case for Diversifying the Tech Workforce ddt, edge

Whether it be market share, creativity, or a moral North Star, when we fail to build inclusive and diverse companies, there is much we stand to lose. Workforces limited in their composition are equally limited in their reach. While countless technology firms make claims about “solving the world’s problems,” too frequently they lack teams with sufficiently variable backgrounds and experiences to build solutions that speak to a broad user base. The Bay Area technology scene is often described in terms of the flurry of activity taking place in San Francisco and Silicon Valley, all the while the region is host to any number of racially and culturally diverse communities known for their production of cultural, intellectual, and business capital. Companies’ failure to recognize and capitalize on the human resources growing out of these communities unknowingly incur marked opportunity costs. Worse, tech firms frequently possess inadequate data to benchmark their internal diversity, all the while competing in a sector in which data is paramount.

In this session, The Hidden Genius Project will share lessons learned from training high school-aged black male youth in software development, entrepreneurship, and leadership skills, in addition to taking them to visit local tech firms. These young men (and so many like them) are proof positive of that underrepresented communities of color within cities like Oakland (which is comprised of 65% people of color). Our intensive programming has taken us to a multitude of tech companies, including nine this past summer. The aforementioned lessons shed light on how firms might consider prioritizing a more inclusive workforce, improving their organizational culture, and enhancing their use of quality data to attract and retain a more robust workforce of color, and subsequently expand their business opportunities.

An intro will be provided by the leader of Women in Wireless discussing the importance of diversity and networking, and then we’ll discuss how mobile data can be used across different demographics. Women led households have tremendous commercial influence, and marketers are looking closely at mobile data to find the best way to reach them. We’ll look at various ways that mobile marketers use data to personalize diverse messages. This panel programmed by Women in Wireless will also show how you can bring diversity to your programs and your work place.